Using products that are natural, plant based, organic and ethically sourced is important to you and you probably scour the list of ingredients in skincare products like a tiger, pouncing on anything synthetic with a growl – off your shopping list that product goes.

The Ytsara ethos places natural, wholesome, sustainably sourced ingredients and manufacturing as the keystone of our entire business but we have to acknowledge one major factor in supplying skincare products sold across the world – the need for preservatives. Ytsara utilizes a food grade preservative system derived from plants that is gentle to the skin. Every one of our formulae uses the minimum percentage possible to protect the product from bacterial attacks

You may be gasping in horror at the thought of preservatives in your skincare and we’d love to do without them but it’s simply not possible. Preservatives are essential for your safety and they extend the shelf life of your skincare products. Imagine if you had to replace your day moisturizer every week, throwing out almost 100% of what you bought?

The hard reality is that anything organic, including skincare, spoils without an effective preservative system. Unless you plan on disposing of your skincare products after a single use (or two), you have to accept preservatives as a necessary ingredient in your natural skincare creams and lotions.

Once you open a product and begin using it, bacteria have the opportunity to make itself at home inside the container and its contents. A soiled finger or cotton pad dipped into a jar or on the lip of a bottle causes contamination and is so easy to do when we are tired or preoccupied. Do you wash and dry your hands between each product application? Double dipping is another bacteria-spreading culprit. Without preservatives, molds, fungi, yeasts and bacteria have absolutely no barrier to multiplying and contaminating your skincare products. At what cost to your health when you apply these contaminated products to your skin?

EU regulations insist that all skincare formulae undergo a challenging test. Under laboratory control, strains of aggressive bacteria, fungus and molds are inoculated into the cream, mimicking dirty fingers dipping into a jar. This tests how the cream will ‘digest’ the invasion of nasties, for how long and how well it will guard the contents against invasion. The cream is then retested and must be sterile with no strains of mold, fungus or bacteria lurking in the jar. Failing this test means the product will not be allowed onto the market and the EU is particularly strict about this.

We share your concerns about chemicals and are 100% with you on avoiding them as much as possible. But not all chemicals are bad – after all, human bodies themselves are made up of chemicals! You can trust Ytsara and our scientists to use the bare minimum of the gentlest preservatives possible, in keeping with our belief of living harmoniously with nature.